I thought I would take the time to write my own take on the changes that have occurred over the past few months, as there is still a lot of misinformation on this forum about what these changes mean for websites.
What are Google Panda & Penguin?
In the most simple terms, Google Panda is a series of updates by Google intended to improve the quality of their search engine results. This means they are focusing on quality rather than quantity - duplicate content is a big no-no and artificially written websites are quickly found out and penalised.
Features that make your site vulnerable to Google Panda
...and Google Penguin?
Google Penguin has recently burst onto the scene and relates specifically to the final point.
It is aimed at specifically penalising those who have artificially built a link profile for their website. This is bad news for those who are looking for an easy buck. No longer can you invest fifty bucks into a mass directory submission service and watch in awe as your site dives straight onto the top page of Google for your targeted keywords.
You'll also be penalised for deliberately targeted specific key phrases when creating backlinks. Here's an example;
Graham has a website that sells socks. He links up with a hundred webmasters, who all have high quality, relevant sites and gets them to add a link to his site with the anchor text 'buy mens socks now'. A couple of months down the line, Google notices that a large proportion of the backlinks for the site have the same anchor text and even worse, this is not the most common anchor text for a sock selling website. The penguin is now angry and Graham sees his sock selling business crash and burn.
So, how do I feed these beasts?
The sites that are doing well out of Panda are the ones which have see progressive, well written content added to the site on a regular basis - effectively Google loves to see sites that people want to share with their friends.
For Penguin, it is absolutely essential for you to build a natural link profile and you need to make sure each link you build is high quality and directly relevant to your website.
OK - fine. However, I hired an SEO company to sort out my SEO for me - so surely I am safe?
Unfortunately, not necessarily. Many SEO companies are struggling to move towards a business model where they can no longer spend minimal time improving SEO on websites and have to invest more of their time and effort into creating quality backlinks and content. This means that they could be still be spinning articles, creating poor backlinks and generally leading your site to the dark side.
What can you do about it? Easy.
I've been submitting my sites to directories for the past months/years etc and now I'm really worried/I've already been hit by Google. What do I do?
You've got several choices.
Hope this helps some people. If you have any questions or need any (limited) advice, then I will be happy to assist!
:wave:
Tom
What are Google Panda & Penguin?
In the most simple terms, Google Panda is a series of updates by Google intended to improve the quality of their search engine results. This means they are focusing on quality rather than quantity - duplicate content is a big no-no and artificially written websites are quickly found out and penalised.
Features that make your site vulnerable to Google Panda
- Unoriginal or duplicate content
- Lack of interactivity on your site (high bounce rates, low visit times etc)
- Unnatural usage of wording (such as keyword stuffing)
- Page titles and content not matching up
- Low quality backlinks
...and Google Penguin?
Google Penguin has recently burst onto the scene and relates specifically to the final point.
It is aimed at specifically penalising those who have artificially built a link profile for their website. This is bad news for those who are looking for an easy buck. No longer can you invest fifty bucks into a mass directory submission service and watch in awe as your site dives straight onto the top page of Google for your targeted keywords.
You'll also be penalised for deliberately targeted specific key phrases when creating backlinks. Here's an example;
Graham has a website that sells socks. He links up with a hundred webmasters, who all have high quality, relevant sites and gets them to add a link to his site with the anchor text 'buy mens socks now'. A couple of months down the line, Google notices that a large proportion of the backlinks for the site have the same anchor text and even worse, this is not the most common anchor text for a sock selling website. The penguin is now angry and Graham sees his sock selling business crash and burn.
So, how do I feed these beasts?
The sites that are doing well out of Panda are the ones which have see progressive, well written content added to the site on a regular basis - effectively Google loves to see sites that people want to share with their friends.
For Penguin, it is absolutely essential for you to build a natural link profile and you need to make sure each link you build is high quality and directly relevant to your website.
OK - fine. However, I hired an SEO company to sort out my SEO for me - so surely I am safe?
Unfortunately, not necessarily. Many SEO companies are struggling to move towards a business model where they can no longer spend minimal time improving SEO on websites and have to invest more of their time and effort into creating quality backlinks and content. This means that they could be still be spinning articles, creating poor backlinks and generally leading your site to the dark side.
What can you do about it? Easy.
- Check your backlinks and see if they look artificial.
- Question what your SEO company is doing to ensure you aren't hit by Panda or Penguin.
- Think to yourself - what on-site optimisation have this company done? If none, you should worry about where your money is being spent. If they have done work on your site, check to see if it looks original, interesting and most importantly, shareable. Find out what work they have done and why they have done it.
I've been submitting my sites to directories for the past months/years etc and now I'm really worried/I've already been hit by Google. What do I do?
You've got several choices.
- Contact webmasters to ask them to remove your links if you believe they may be helping get you penalised / will cause a penalty for your site. This is not recommended as it is extremely time consuming.
- Get stuck in and work to improve your on-site and off-site SEO. Build up quality backlinks to negate the bad effect your poor quality backlinks and if you do see falls, they will be significantly less than before. You're also less likely to be blacklisted completely.
- Get an SEO company to sort your site out. Ask them specifically what they are going to do to 'fix' your site. If they mention any of the following, run and run fast. - non-niche targeted directory submissions; article spinning; web 2.0 link building, 'secondary backlinking' etc.etc. Absolutely make sure you avoid any SEO company that promises '1st page results in X months' for completely unreasonable keywords e.g. 'web hosting' or 'travel insurance' (with the odd exception); both off-site and on-site SEO should be long term projects. If you can't afford $200+ minimum per month for SEO services then you are really best off just doing the best you can, yourself. For $200 a month, you'll probably get a couple of hours a week of an SEO consultants time, which is really going to be a bare minimum to actually do the work necessary to build your sites rankings 'naturally'.
Hope this helps some people. If you have any questions or need any (limited) advice, then I will be happy to assist!
:wave:
Tom
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.. any idea about recent penguin update 1.1?
